THERE was no mourning period for James Easdale among the vast majority of Rangers supporters.
The younger of the Easdale brothers became the first faller ahead of the EGM which will determine the club's future next Friday. News travels fast, which meant there was the sound of celebrations before he'd even hit the ground. The reaction, at least on social media, was just about unanimous: one down, three to go.
An active campaign has seen the percentage of the club owned by ordinary supporters steadily creep up, fraction by fraction, but the resignation of Easdale saw a sudden lurch which shot Dave King 25 percent of the way towards the outcome he wants at the EGM on March 6. The resolution calling for Easdale to be removed will now be wiped from the agenda, the crosshairs instead fixing on the remaining three of the four original targets: chairman David Somers, chief executive Derek Llambias and finance director Barry Leach. If those three go the other Easdale, Sandy, who is on the football board but not the PLC one, inevitably will follow straight away.
There was a natural, excited reaction to the early morning stock exchange announcement that James Easdale had fallen on his sword, with fevered speculation that it would be a day of the long knives in which the rest would topple out behind him. Instead, Easdale was the only casualty of the current battle. There is still lobbying and voting to be done by King's side to get rid of the others and appoint him, Paul Murray and John Gilligan in their place, but the resignation of one of the central figures resulted in gleeful online joy.
It was been a good 48 hours for the Ibrox insurgents. The Rangers Supporters Trust had eaten into the stock controlled by Sandy Easdale by buying 450,000 shares from Beaufort Nominees, crucially reducing the expected vote for the board and increasing the numbers for King et al. All of the recent counts and informed speculation points to King having more than the 50 percent support he needs for his resolutions to pass. James Easdale's departure did not affect the numbers but boosted their spirits still further.
Easdale was a passive, undemonstrative figure in public, less influential around Ibrox than Sandy. As far as many are concerned the brothers represent an inseparable whole, of course, and it was inevitable that his departure was interpreted as an indicator of which way the wind is blowing. Why would Easdale quit if the incumbent board felt it was going to survive the EGM? According to his statement Easdale had had enough and felt there was a greater prospect of peace around Rangers if he removed himself from the premises. There had been rumours for some time that he had had enough. But his departure was also seen by some as a sign of a crack in the relationship between the Easdales and Mike Ashley. Such is the wariness towards Ashley that there is a theory he has some sort of power move up his sleeve ahead of the EGM. If he does, his plans didn't include James Easdale.
The Rangers board - which laughably now consists only of Somers, Llambias and Leach (the latter pair were not even on the scene before October) - could appoint a new director to replace Easdale. It is thought unlikely that they will.
As for James Easdale, he was a non-executive Rangers director for 19 months and in that time he publicy said next to nothing. Resigning was by far the most popular move he ever made.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article